Charles Ross has had quite a few mentions elsewhere on the website. He crops up in several ‘On This Day’ pieces, and in 2017 we published a two-part Penwith Paper on his brief term as an MP and its rather lively ending. This is not surprising; .he’s an important figure in the town’s Victorian history. True, he doesn’t have a statue – but then, Humphry Davy doesn’t have a major piece of infrastructure named after him
My presentation at the Penzance Literary Festival 2024 aimed to look beyond the bridge, the ballot box and the bank… and instead focus on Ross as an ‘extraordinary person.’
Born in London in 1849, Charles Campbell Ross was the grandson of banker Joseph Carne, and probably a nephew of free-thinker, philanthropist and scholar Elizabeth Carne.[1]
Brighton College – founded 1845 and a forming influence on the mind of Charles Campbell Ross
cc-by-sa/2.0 - © Paul Gillett - geograph.org.uk/p/1598644
Joseph Carne, grandfather of Charles Campbell Ross
By Mellangoose - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=141046750
He was educated at Brighton College, but had arrived in Penzance by January 1870, when he was amongst the guests listed at an Archery Club dance.[2] That April he was one of a group who put on a show in Madron schoolroom to raise funds for new pews: most of the ‘leading families’ of Penzance bought tickets at a shilling a time, and the event was a great success.[3]
In September young Charles Ross – still aged only 21 –married the slightly less young Isabella Carne at St Mary’s church. She is generally said to have been his cousin but may not have been a blood relative; Isabella was a widow, and had been married to a Rev John Carne of Merther, who had moved to Penzance before his death.[4]
At first, the couple lived at Penhale House. This had formerly been the grammar school attended by - amongst others - Humphry Davy, but has since been rebuilt.[5] It might seem a fine enough home for a couple in their 20s – not to mention their lady’s maid, housemaid and cook - but by 1873 they had moved on, probably straight to Morrab House, now the Morrab Library. [6] This became Ross’s family home, and in due course Carne’s bank became his bank. At the 1881 census Charles and Isabella Ross were still at Morrab House, with their son Archibald, daughter Oenone, and a nephew aged five. The servant tally had by now risen to nine.[7]
Going up in the world: at about the time the National School was opened over the road, the Ross family had moved from Penhale House…
… to Morrab House. The Ross family had made this move by 1873, when Charles Campbell Ross was 24
Meanwhile, Ross had widened his interests to include support for some of the town’s most notable institutions: the Public Dispensary, the Institute - and even the new National School which at the time was being built almost opposite his Penhale House home, and to which he nevertheless donated £10, the equivalent of £1,000 today.[8] This was a startlingly generous, or perhaps naive, response to a potential source of noise and nuisance a few yards from his own front door – although he would have leased, not owned, Penhale House. He may have come to regret his support, as he moved out shortly after the school opened.
Ross was also an entrepreneur, with a partnership in Downing, Ross and Co, a business selling fish in Genoa.[9] When he gave a debut public lecture on English ballads, a reviewer complimented him on being ‘the complete master of his subject,’ with ‘flashes of wit’ enlivening his intelligent contextualisation of the texts.[10] The same review suggests that Ross broke into song to illustrate his points - but took a dim view of ‘the vulgarity of the modern so-called comic songs.’
Ross does not seem to have had a strong religious faith. But he was a temperance activist in the Carne family tradition, and in 1874 was chosen to lay the foundation stone of the new Abbey Street Temperance Hall.[11] He was introduced as:
‘…the representative of a family long identified with what is noblest and most charitable – with the commercial, moral and religious interests of Penzance for more than one generation past.’
The family was, of course, the Carnes, and before her death Ross’s aunt Elizabeth had made the donation that set the ball rolling for the new building. In his speech, Ross took a line that we would recognise today as both enlightened and compassionate; identifying poor housing and what we would now term social isolation, rather than moral weakness, as the main factors driving men to excessive drinking.
Elizabeth Carne, aunt of Charles Campbell Ross
Melissa Hardie, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
The site of the new Temperance Hall as shown bottom left on 1882 OS map sheet LXXIV.2
Reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland
When Ross was voted onto Penzance Town Council at the age of 26, he was said to be the youngest man who had ever taken his seat there. He became mayor in 1877, the youngest person to do so until Simon Reed in the late 20th century. [12] In his acceptance speech, Ross outlined his vision for the future: a new ‘central road’ from the town to the Promenade, a roadway and bridge to connect the Albert and South Piers, and a building society to encourage improvement of the housing stock – the poor quality of which was felt to be discouraging wealthy incomers from settling in the town. [13] Morrab Road, and Wharf Road – including, of course, Ross Bridge - would later materialise as part of his legacy.
Ross represented himself as a public-spirited man with great loyalty to town:
‘He had said to himself – ‘You own property in this town, you are largely interested in the welfare of this town: here will, in all probability, be spent the greater portion of your life, and here you will die. Will you be content simply to live and make a little money – to live first for yourself, with no thought for the general welfare of the place, which you have made your home, careless of its interests, mindful only of your own – content to live, to die, to be forgotten?’
When he was re-elected for a third consecutive term in 1879, he was the first man to be thus honoured since 1708: he went on to serve five terms as mayor between 1877 and 1884, two of them while he was also Conservative MP for the Borough of St Ives.[14]
The name and coat of arms of Charles Ross, as represented on a link of the mayoral chain
Photo Kevin Camidge, by the kind arrangement of Penzance Town Council
A rather dandified young man? A rare image of – probably – the camera-shy Charles Campbell Ross, apparently wearing an elaborate buttonhole or insignia
Image courtesy Penlee House Gallery & Museum, Penzance
Once installed as mayor, Ross quickly set to work selling his plan for the new floating dock to voters and fellow-councillors. Although his path was not an easy one, he prevailed, and the foundation stone was laid in October 1879.[15] Down at the bottom of the harbour was (and quite possibly still is) a piece of granite weighing 3.5 tons. Spectators – some of them, remarkably, ‘ladies’ – had followed the official party down the wooden ramp into the mud. Mayor Ross applied the mortar, stood back while the stone was lowered into place, and checked that it was level and true. Then he declared – ‘in a clear voice, heard all around’ – that the first stone was laid.
Mayor Ross expressed his conviction that the finished dock would, ‘for many, many generations,’ bring ‘prosperity to our dearly-beloved town.’ He hoped that the enterprise would prosper, and earn the respect of posterity. ‘Bold… manly… wise and prudent…undaunted,’ he prophesied, they would face setbacks ‘cheerfully.’ Future generations would judge that they had ‘manfully accepted the responsibility’ and ‘quitted themselves like men.’
What can possibly go wrong…?
Laying the foundation stone of the new ‘floating dock’
Image courtesy Penlee House Gallery & Museum, Penzance
A close-up of Charles Ross in his mayoral chain at the ceremony, recognisably the same man as in fig 8 above. Is he glowering towards the camera – or just fully ‘in the moment’ and focussed on the task in hand?
Image courtesy Penlee House Gallery & Museum, Penzance
Although a bold and ambitious mayor, Ross was passive and quiescent as an MP. He sat quietly in the House of Commons for two years before making his maiden speech – or may not have been a regular attender at Westminster. When he did speak for the first time, it was in support of banning the ‘unmanly and brutal pastime’ of pigeon shooting, although Ross was careful to explain that he had no objection to what are now called ‘country sports.’[16] Ross introduced himself as a member of the RSPCA Council, and said that he had been prompted to speak ‘in defence of the defenceless. The difficulty of squaring this with support for fishing and shooting – which Ross assured his fellow MPs he ‘loved,’ being ‘as fond of sport as any member of the House’ - troubles the RSPCA to this day.
When he moved up the hill to Carne House in 1882, Ross assured the guests at his house-warming that although he and his family might have moved out to the countryside, ‘their hearts were still in Penzance.’[17] But after his disappointment at the 1885 election, nothing seems to have gone quite right for the Ross family. In the last image we have of Charles Campbell Ross, laying the foundation stone of what would later be the Free Library at the top of Morrab Road, he is becoming stout and looks older than his 37 years. Isabella died quite suddenly in 1888, aged only 44.[18] And after this came the well-documented banking crisis of the late 1890s – and Ross’s mysterious and rapid departure.
In 1886, his parliamentary career over, Ross lays the foundation stone of what would later become the public library in Morrab Road
Image courtesy Penlee House Gallery & Museum, Penzance
The evidence of his public career suggests that Ross was happy to accept risk and perhaps rather soft-hearted: not an ideal combination in a banker. He explained to shareholders that for some time, Carne’s had been wrestling with a shortfall in profit. They had decided to sell out to the Bolitho-owned Consolidated Bank. [19] Ross added his ‘sincere congratulation’ to the staff, all of whom had found new posts: the partners had, he said, been ‘distressed’ to let go such a ‘trustworthy and efficient body of men.’
Ross had been with Carne, Carne and Batten for 30 years, and had an exemplary record of public record service. At first he was trusted to ensure that the shareholders – mostly local businessmen and small investors – came through the crisis safety. But as the hearings proceeded, worrying details came out.[20] The receiver was surprised to learn that Carne’s had handed an unsecured loan of over £3,000 to one local business with very haphazard book-keeping. Seven more local traders had been allowed to run up overdrafts of up to £7,000. One of these had been seen riding around with his wife - who owned a sealskin jacket worth perhaps £7 - on new bicycles. All this had been aided and abetted by Ross, who had encouraged the bicycling entrepreneur to open a new account and have a go at the potato trade.
A century later, we find ourselves in a world of ‘magic money tree’ and banks ‘too big to fail.’ But in late Victorian Britain, small banks still prevailed in every town and paper money was considered a proxy for assets and ultimately gold reserves. The consequences of the bank failure for Ross, his partners and the shareholders were dramatic and far-reaching. In January 1898, the public trooped up the hill to inspect the Ross family’s former home prior to the auction of both house and contents.[21] At a meeting later that month, the key question was: ‘Where is Mr Charles Ross?’ [22] He had resigned his role as chief liquidator, and seemed to have disappeared. And it emerged that his own bank had given him an unsecured loan of £38,000 - the equivalent of £41,4007,000 today.
One heckler denounced Ross – once the golden boy and leading light of the town – as a liar. A shout of ‘Arrest him!’ was greeted by cheers, and his ‘written pledge’ to make himself available at the proper time was greeted with ‘loud derisive laughter’ and ‘hisses.’ The revelation that he was still being paid £50 a month for his duties as liquidator gave rise to a loud outbreak of hissing, hooting and cries of ‘Shame!’ Ross was said to have returned to London, his birthplace. There, he was rumoured to have been seen at the theatre, in a two-guinea box.
Ross had indeed bolted for London. At the 1901 census, he was living at Ellison Road, Streatham. The solid, bay-fronted properties with long gardens survive. One changed hands three years ago for over £1.5m - but compared to Carne House, it was a step down in the world, and Ross was having to make do with only one general servant.[23]
Later he re-married and moved to Tottenham before returning to Streatham where he died, aged 71, in 1921.[24] He left an estate of less than £1,500. But in other ways, Ross made profitable use of the 24 years remaining to him after he left Penzance. He became secretary of the Whitechapel Art Gallery, founded in 1901 to offer ‘the finest art of the world for the people of the East End.’ Passmore Edwards was the architect of the building, and 260,000 people visited its first exhibition, ‘Modern Pictures by Living Artists, Pre-Raphaelites and Old Masters.’ The following year, the gallery had an exhibition of Cornish art – did Charles Ross have a hand in the choice?
Whitechapel Art Gallery, where Charles Ross meets Passmore Edwards – and in 1902, an exhibition of Cornish Art
© Copyright Peter Trimming and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence
For so important a man in the history of Penzance, Ross remains – on a personal level - strangely anonymous. No officially verified or posed images of him survive; no mayoral portrait. Even the Ross Bridge was threatened with re-badging in 1969, when it was suggested that a proposed replacement should be named the Harold Wilson bridge in honour of the Labour Prime Minister, who regularly passed through Penzance on his way to Scilly.[25] But luckily for Ross, he was spared this indignity: his name has stayed, and the new bridge was finally opened a decade later – by another Conservative MP, David Harris.
Ross Bridge – saved from ignominious rebadging, and still safely within the bailiwick of Tory heritage
‘Here will, in all probability, be spent the greater portion of your life,’ Ross had said to himself when he was made mayor of Penzance at the age of 28, ‘and here you will die. Will you be content simply to live and make a little money… to die, to be forgotten?’
Charles Campbell Ross spent fewer than 30 of his 71 years in the Penzance area.
More than a little money passed through his hands.
He died in London.
He is not forgotten.
Linda Camidge November 2024
General References
A History of the Town and Borough of Penzance P A S Pool 1974
Census and BMD details from https://ukcensusonline.com
All newspaper quotations from https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk
For a detailed account of Ross’ election as MP for the Borough of St Ives, and his failed attempt to become MP for the new St Ives constituency in 1885, see our Penwith Papers May 2017 https://www.penwithlocalhistorygroup.co.uk/the-penwith-papers/?id=9 and July 2017 https://www.penwithlocalhistorygroup.co.uk/the-penwith-papers/?id=10
For background and an imaginative take on the banking crisis, see our ‘On This Day’ items for 9th July https://www.penwithlocalhistorygroup.co.uk/on-this-day/?id=340 , 15th November https://www.penwithlocalhistorygroup.co.uk/on-this-day/?id=290 and 21st December https://www.penwithlocalhistorygroup.co.uk/on-this-day/?id=312
All the above websites accessed 21 11 2024
[1] For more on Elizabeth Carne’s career, family and friends see https://www.arthurquillercouch.com/studies/womens-contribution-scientific-and-intellectual-life-penzance-18th-and-early-19th-centuries (accessed 21 11 2024), and Elizabeth Carne of Chapel Street Melissa Hardie 2023; appendix 2 lists the children of Josph Carne; Mary (1811-1890) is generally stated to have been the mother of Charles Campbell Ross but I have been unable to find any firm evidence of this
[2] ‘The Mount’s Bay Archery Club’ Cornish Telegraph 26 1 1870 p 4 col 3
[3] ‘Madron’ Cornish Telegraph 4 5 1870 p 3 col 1
[4] The marriage is recorded in Cornish Telegraph 28 9 1870 p 2 col 5. I have been unable to find out any more about Isabella’s connection with the Carne family. https://www.myheritage.com/names/isabel_carne (accessed 25 11 2024) suggests that her birth name was Carne – and also that she was five years older than Charles Campbell. If she was a widow the age difference is likely, but her birth name being ‘Carne’ less so
[5] Review of the Architecture of Penzance, Peter Laws, in Pool (p 192), suggests that the rebuild may have taken place before Ross lived there
[6] 1881 census; sale advertisement for Penhale House, ‘late in the occupation of C C Ross Esq’ Cornish Telegraph 3 12 1873 p 2 col 2
[7] Census 1881. I have not been able to find any further official reference to Oenone, although she took part in a fancy dress party in 1893 (‘Juvenile Fancy Dress Ball at Trevean’ Cornishman 19 1 1893 p 6 col 3) and a Miss Oenone Ross – probably the same person – attended a London funeral in 1938, along with a ‘Mrs C C Ross’ who may well have been Charles Campbell’s second wife ‘Miss Anna Batten’ Cornishman 27 1 1938 p 2 col 4
[8] ‘Penzance Public Dispensary’ – ‘Officers for the Ensuing Year’ Cornish Telegraph 26 4 1871 p 4 col 1, ‘Correspondence’ – ‘The New Infirmary’ letter signed by Ross as Hon Secretary Cornish Telegraph 31 12 1873 p 2 col 7; ‘The Penzance Institute’ Cornish Telegraph 2 4 1873 p 2 col 5; ‘Subscriptions Towards the Building of the New National School’ Cornish Telegraph 23 8 1871 p 2 col 3; https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/monetary-policy/inflation/inflation-calculator (accessed 23 11 2024)
[9] ‘Partnership Dissolved’ Cornish Telegraph 24 9 1873 p 3 col 2; Ross and Downing continued although the partnership was dissolved on the retirement of one of the other partners.
[10] ‘The Penzance Institute’ Cornish Telegraph 2 4 1873 p 2 col 5
[11] ‘Laying the Memorial-Stone of a New Temperance Hall for Penzance’ Cornish Telegraph 1 7 1874 p 4 col 3
[12] ‘Notes of the Week’ items beginning ‘The chief event’ and ‘The mayoralty dinner’ Cornish Telegraph 13 11 1877 p 2 col 6
[13] ‘Election of the Mayor of Penzance’ Cornish Telegraph 13 11 1877 p 4 col 2
[14] Pool list of mayors pp 279-283
[15] ‘Laying the First Stone of the New Penzance Docks… the Mayor’s Luncheon’ Cornishman 6 11 1879 p 8 col 3
[16] https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/commons/1883/mar/07/second-reading#S3V0276P0_18830307_HOC_14 (accessed 20 11 2024)
[17] ‘House-Warming at Carne’ Cornish Telegraph 26 10 1882 p 5 col 5
[18] Civil Registration deaths 1837-2005, ‘Death of Mrs Charles Ross of Carne’ Cornishman 27 12 1888 p 3 col 1
[19] ‘The Absorption of Messrs Batten, Carne and Carne’s Bank’ Cornishman 24 12 1896 p 8 cols 1-4
[20] See for example ‘The bankruptcy of Mr W H Rose’ Cornishman 28 10 1897 p 6 col 2 (with its hint of ‘larger developments’), ‘The Bankruptcy of R C Lovell’ Cornish Telegraph 23 6 1898 p 3 cols 1-2, ‘Batten, Carne and Carne’s Bank in a London Law-court’ Cornishman 4 8 1898 p 6 col 2
[21] ‘Sales by Auction’ – ‘Carne near Penzance’ Cornishman 6 1 1898 p 1 col 2, 13 1 1898 p 1 col 1, ‘Meeting of the Shareholders’ final paragraph beginning ‘Although the proceedings’ Cornish Telegraph 20 1 1898 p 5 cols 3-4.)
[22] ‘Batten, Carne & Carne’s Banking Co’ – ‘Where is Mr Ross?’ Cornish Telegraph 27 1 1898 p 2 col 1, ‘Some Questions’ and ‘Mr Ross’s Overdraft’ col 4; ‘Messrs Batten, Carne and Carne’ Cornishman 27 1 1898 p 6 col 1; col 3 for the allusion to his expectations
[23] https://www.rightmove.co.uk/house-prices/details/england-88631863-13043851?s=e05bbda8d932bbadb0a573e1e64765ed5418c74c192c1b105784851c71e3fd61#
[24] 1911 census, short paragraph beginning ‘Mr Charles Campbell Ross’ East London Observer 5 2 1921 p 2 col 7
[25] ‘ “Harold Wilson Bridge” as Ross Bridge Replacement?’ Cornishman 18 12 1969 p 5 cols 2-3
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